Embodiments of the inventive concept relate generally to virtualization technology. More particularly, embodiments of the inventive concept relate to virtual systems and methods of analyzing the operation of virtual systems.
In a virtual system, a virtualization layer is installed on physical hardware resources to create virtual hardware resources. The virtual hardware resources, which often take the form of virtual machines, can be used to run programs such as operating systems and application programs. The most common form of virtualization layer is a type of virtualization software referred to as a hypervisor. Examples of hypervisors include Xen or VMware hypervisors.
Xen hypervisors can virtualize hardware resources in IA-32, x86-64, IA-64 and Power PC 970 architectures. VMware hypervisors can virtualize hardware resources of x86 compatible computers, such as Vmware workstations, Vmware servers, and a VM players. Some versions of Xen support only para-virtualization, so conventional operating systems may require source modification in order to run on the hypervisor. Other versions of Xen support full-virtualization, so conventional operating systems can run on the hypervisor without of source modification.
One benefit of virtualization is that it can allow multiple operating systems to run on a single set of physical hardware resources, even though each individual operating system may require access to a separate set of virtual hardware resources. For instance, each operating system may require its own central processing unit (CPU), memory, network interface, and so on. These resources can be provided in virtual form through the virtualization layer.